When we were in Ventura, California I dragged my family away from the beach and the usual touristy stuff...
to visit the Post Office, more accurately to gaze upon the 360 view of murals painted by Gordon Grant as part of the WPA's Art Program during the Great Depression.
A small part of the New Deal program, detailed here on Wikipedia that was envisioned by Franklin Roosevelt's administration to put to work many of the young men that had lost their jobs because of the crashing economy...
FDR put Harry Hopkins in charge of the WPA and Hopkins put Holgar Cahill in charge of the Arts programs. And it is a wonderful thing that Hopkins was of the opinion that "artist have to eat as well," so 15,000 to 20,000 pieces of artwork were created between 1935 and the middle of World War 2.
Gordon Kenneth Grant, came from an artist family, his father. Gordon Hope Grant, was an illustrator who worked with The Saturday Evening Post and the Boy Scouts of America. His son, painted the mural at the Ventura Post Office...
In the style of "America Scene" painting, bringing to mind the industrious farmer and worker in their orchards and fields the Ventura Post Office murals are not that dissimilar to other patriotic works of the time to encourage a since of national pride and communal direction.
Like this painting of young steelworkers coming out of the USSR. View more Socialist Realism paintings here.
But even though the panels at Ventura post office and other WPA murals have somewhat of a propaganda tilt to them, they have not become a national treasure.
And in recent years, as the memory of that time in our national history fades away with the passing of the people who lived it, we are also losing the art as well, as new government buildings and public works are being built the painting, sculptures, and panels are being stuffed away in storage, claimed by unknown entities or thrown away.
The effort to retain these pieces that belong to us all and protect them was recently highlighted on Antiques Road Show, click below to watch...
Art. as I have said before, meaning nothing...
It is not necessary to live, can not sustain life or protect it.
But Art also means everything...
and does a very good job of declaring who we are and where came from.
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